The Austrian E-Business Evolution

This papers describes the development of e- and m-business in Austria during the last four years. Our theoretical <br/>framework is based on the ecology-oriented business framework developed by James Moore and the e-business <br/>oriented advancement of Moore's theory by Scharl & Brandtweiner as well as on a more technology oriented <br/>framework presented by Werthner and Klein to identify the IT-infrastructure related parameters influencing the <br/>building of an e-business strategy as well as external parameters for e-business solutions. The empirical data has <br/>been collected in four quantitative surveys. In each of the four surveys we took the same normative approach: Based <br/>on our theoretical framework, we developed a number of research questions on some of the necessities and ISinfrastructure <br/>prerequisites for successfully implementing e-business strategies and derived hypotheses to be tested <br/>in our research. In all four surveys the Austrian Top-500 companies have been the unit of analysis. The <br/>questionnaires have been sent to the IT managers of the Austrian Top 500 companies. The findings show that within <br/>the last four years the companies have prepared their IT and telecommunications infrastructure but are still lacking <br/>an overall e- and m-business strategy. This means that the majority of the analyzed companies – according to <br/>adaptation of Moore´s model for e-commerce strategies – is still at the beginning of the expansion stage. At least <br/>they have already prepared their infrastructure for e-business but clear e- and m-commerce business models and a <br/>smooth inclusion of these business models in an overall business strategy is still missing.